Małgorzata Wakuluk: Not What You Think
© Małgorzata Wakuluk
The puzzel: On the work of Małgorzata Wakuluk
The photographic work of Polish photographer Małgorzata Wakuluk raises a number of interesting considerations as we reflect on the nature of images, representations and the “making” of photographs (making is different from taking). Małgorzata invites us to move away from looking out to looking in. The images are not about “things” in the world but are emblematic feelings and sensations in the realm of a psychological quest, an inner quest. A quest with no fixed meaning, leaving the reader of her visual text to piece it together.
As I have written before in VASA, images are their meanings are the result of a complex set of relationships between the author/image-maker and the viewer/reader (we read images as we read texts, images like written texts that are constructed significations or codified). What mediates this relationship is the “image”. The image is the result of a range of decisions made by the image-maker in the production of the image. The author of the text becomes the first reader/viewer of their image. This is where decisions are made if the image “works” or des not meet the intentions of its author – it does not “work”.
As soon as you open the image in Photoshop decisions are made to modify it. As an author edits written text the image-maker edits/modifies the visual to speak to their intentions. From the moment the photographer/author records the image the decision making process has started (The time before also determines the image: the decision to photograph, where to stand, and what technology to use.).
Simply put, the image is the result of internal decisions shaped by the technological, the psychological, the social/cultural, the image paradigm and historical factors. An image is created (and selected) because it meets the expectations of a reflective process within a paradigm. Nathan Lyons referred to this process as the “moment of decision” which points to the mind behind the camera. Where as the “decisive moment” concept refers to the external world in front of the lens.
It is fair to say that the viewer/reader applies the same process as the photographer/author to the decoding of the image(s). Through a set of historical expectations, drawing upon cultural and social knowledge embedded within the intention of viewing, the viewer imposes meanings on the image creating an experience, constructing the image experienced. In this sense, from a viewer’s perspective there is no “meaning”, there is no image (codified) until they/we say there is. To exist the image needs a viewer.
As we “look” at images, truly look and not just stroll by, we become active participants. We scan and search for relationships on which we can pin meanings to; we begin to see. The decoding and deconstruction activity of making and viewing, exploring possible meanings, confirming and rejecting interpretations leads to the act of seeing, the codification of experience.
Putting everything else aside – the politics and business of art photography, the seduction of the technology, the beauty of the print as object – the image as a codified text to be experienced and understood in various relationships and contexts, between and within other images, reveals the nature of the reader.
Returning to the VASA exhibition by Małgorzata Wakuluk we are challenged to make sense of it. We are not shown views of the external world (objects, places, people) but are invited into an internal world. A world that is not neatly defined for us through the lens. We are not given an easy entry into the meaning(s) of the images or of the series. In the search for meaning through and between images in this exhibition, the persistent viewer, if still enough, can sense their mind at work: looking, comparing, rejecting and struggling to make sense of the experience. Actually taking what she has given us (we only know this from what we attend to and see) the reader of her text calls upon their own social-cultural frame to give sense to the body of work experienced here. The meaning that we create is ours alone framed in a fluid relationship between the image (perceived) and our own internal coding or meaning creation. The internalization of the experience is grounded on the reader’s social-cultural grounding allowing them to frame the work within their own universe of meaning.
It is obvious that Małgorzata’s work is constructed through the codes of movement, tones (not colors), and lack of sharp focus, creating ambiguity. These technical and perceptual lens act as a portal for the viewer (reader) to evolve from a simple and direct reading of the work to more complex understandings. The codes evolve out of what some may term the language of the medium. We have learned through experience that close-ups, low angle, movement, etc. have come to signify. Małgorzata requires us to work, reflect and reconsider, in short decode the text. It is only through her last image in the sequence that the curtain is pulled back revealing what is behind it: a woman. To that point the reader is left to complete the puzzle, to construct connections, and to consider the space between the images.
To see the puzzle you have to stand back and look again. This time considering all the parts, seeing them differently in a new context, connecting the pieces, making sense.
The title of her VASA exhibition and accompanying book is “It is not what you think”. The title alone steers the reader to consider what is not seen. She is telling us that her images to go beyond the surface, requiring more than a light reading, and encourages you to do the same.
Meaning is not fixed or stable, it is fluid and dynamic. Returning to see her work builds upon what was constructed or read before. It may be similar to returning to a place where you photographed earlier to see what you did not. There are no rules or formulas to this paradigm, just experiences.
© Roberto Muffoletto, 2020